


Things Can Still Be New

by colazitron



Series: 2015 December Holiday Fic Countdown [16]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-16
Updated: 2015-12-16
Packaged: 2018-05-07 03:12:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5441363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colazitron/pseuds/colazitron
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zayn comes over unexpectedly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things Can Still Be New

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Nacre_Voit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nacre_Voit/gifts).



Liam’s puttering about on his own, his parents out for the night, singing along to Michael Bublé, when his phone suddenly lights up with an incoming call.

_Zayn Malik_

Liam stares at the phone for a second ring, the full name still feeling too formal, but anything else having seamed inappropriate after Zayn left.

Then he picks up.

“Hi.”

“Hey, Liam,” Zayn says, voice drawling the way it always does. It’s a shock of familiarity when all of Liam’s brain thinks this should feel unfamiliar, and he doesn’t really know how to respond to any of the emotions he feels every time he talks to Zayn. Not that it happens often.

“Hey,” Liam echoes. “You okay? You need something?”

It’s rude, maybe, to insinuate that that’s the only reason Zayn would’ve called, but Liam asks more because he’s worried that maybe something really isn’t alright.

“No, no, just…” Zayn says and then drifts off for a long handful of seconds. “I’m just… just in the neighbourhood and wondered if it’d be alright if I came over for a bit?”

His voice goes up towards the end of the sentence, Zayn clearing his throat after like he wants to cough the insecurity right out of his tone.

“Oh,” Liam says. Whatever he actually was expecting, this wasn’t it. “Yeah. Sure.”

“Okay. I’m about twenty minutes away, so… see you then,” Zayn says and hangs up without giving Liam a chance to say anything else.

To say that things are awkward between them when Zayn comes over, shopping bags dangling from his cold fingers, the snow no one thought would actually fall stuck in his hair, and beard, and even his stupid eyelashes, would be an understatement. Liam doesn’t know what to say to him, doesn’t even really know how to look at him – especially when he’s never been here before the split, except for that first time when they’d all come over for a housewarming sort of thing. It just reminds Liam of everything that they don’t have anymore, seeing him here now, in his comfy jumper and his new beard. Of everything they could’ve had if— if things were different.

But then, after a good thirty minutes of the most awkward small talk Liam has ever gone through with someone he once loved as much as he did Zayn, Zayn pulls something out of one of his bags, offering it to Liam. A first edition Frank Miller, not even wrapped or anything, but it sets them off – common ground and something that’s nothing to do with them, with how much Zayn hurt, with how much he hurt them. Maybe this is what they need, not to talk about what’s “important”, but just to talk. To get used to each others’ voices again.

They spend the next hour or two chatting and laughing, Zayn mocking Liam’s continued attempts at decorating, but agreeing to help him put up the Christmas lights outside anyway. It’s far easier than Liam could have hoped.

“I’m really not sure this is safe,” Zayn says, stood up on the porch railing with Liam’s hands holding on to his legs, steadying him as he’s trying to wind the string of lights around the top of a post.

“Nothing’s gonna happen,” Liam says, trying not to roll his eyes but probably sounding like it anyway. He can feel one of Zayn’s legs twitch like he’s thinking about kicking him. Or maybe just because Zayn doesn’t like heights.

Nothing does happen, they string the lights up more or less in silence, and no one falls. Liam plugs the lights into the external socket, and they beam up at the lights beaming down at them in mutual silence, basking in having accomplished their task.

It’s only when they make their way back to the house that Zayn slips on the fresh snow.

“Whoa!” Liam calls, reaching out without thinking to grab hold of whatever part of Zayn he can reach – his arm – and pulls him close, winding his second arm around his waist to steady him.

Zayn clings back, chin hooked over Liam’s shoulder for a moment and Liam thinks he can almost feel the harsh beat of his heart, even through all their layers. He can definitely smell his cologne, that spicy scent he prefers, and it’s such an intense reminder of how close he used to be to Zayn all of the time, that he hugs him closer for a precious few seconds before letting him go.

“Thanks,” Zayn says when he pulls away, smiling despite the mishap, eyes dropping down to Liam’s mouth so quickly Liam’s not sure if he imagined it.

“Anytime,” he says, and means it more than he might want to.

Zayn continues to smile at him, and it coaxes one out of Liam as well, bathed in the warm yellow-white light of the Christmas lights, snowflakes slowly dancing groundwards around them.

Very slowly, giving Liam ample time to realize what’s happening and stop it if he so chooses, Zayn leans forward and presses a sweet, chaste kiss to Liam’s cheek.

“My hero,” he demurs when he’s pulled back again, the same way he’d do whenever Liam would do anything for him, be it of little or more consequence.

Liam’s frozen for a moment, but then he grins back, heart glowing in his chest and thawing away at whatever it is that’s stuck in his veins when he’s around Zayn now.

“Anytime.”

 

****

The End


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